Jeremiah 8:1-3
New English Translation
8 The Lord says, “When that time comes,[a] the bones of the kings of Judah and its leaders, the bones of the priests and prophets, and of all the other people who lived in Jerusalem will be dug up from their graves. 2 They will be spread out and exposed to the sun, the moon, and the stars.[b] These are things they[c] adored and served, things to which they paid allegiance,[d] from which they sought guidance and worshiped. The bones of these people[e] will never be regathered and reburied. They will be like manure used to fertilize the ground.[f] 3 However, I will leave some of these wicked people alive and banish them to other places. But wherever these people who survive may go, they will wish they had died rather than lived,”[g] says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.[h]
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Jeremiah 8:1 tn Heb “At that time.”
- Jeremiah 8:2 tc MT, 4QJera and LXX read, “the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven,” but 4QJerc reads, “the sun and all the stars.”tn Heb “the host of heaven.”
- Jeremiah 8:2 tn Heb “the sun, moon, and host of heaven which they…”
- Jeremiah 8:2 tn Heb “followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.
- Jeremiah 8:2 tn Heb “they will not.” But the referent is far enough removed that it might be ambiguous.
- Jeremiah 8:2 tn Heb “like dung/manure on the surface of the ground.”
- Jeremiah 8:3 tn Heb “Death will be chosen rather than life by the remnant who are left from this wicked family in all the places where I have banished them.” The sentence is broken up and restructured to avoid possible confusion because of the complexity of the English to some modern readers. There appears to be an extra “those who are left” that was inadvertently copied from the preceding line. It is missing from one Hebrew ms and from the Greek and Syriac versions and is probably not a part of the original text.
- Jeremiah 8:3 tn Heb “Yahweh of Armies.”sn For the significance of this title see the notes at 2:19 and 7:3.
Jeremiah 8:1-3
Amplified Bible
The Sin and Treachery of Judah
8 “At that time,” says the Lord, “they [the Babylonian army] will bring out from their graves the [a]bones of the kings of Judah, the bones of its princes, the bones of the priests, the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 2 They will [carelessly scatter and] spread them out before the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven, which the dead have loved and which they have served, and which they have walked after and which they have sought, and which they have worshiped. They will not be gathered or be buried; they will be like [b]dung on the face of the earth. 3 And death will be chosen rather than life by all the remnant of those who remain of this evil family (nation), who remain in all the places to which I have driven them,” says the Lord of hosts.
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Jeremiah 8:1 The graves were opened to get any treasure they might contain, but the bones were scattered in order to humiliate and intimidate the Jews.
- Jeremiah 8:2 The man-made gods of the stars and the moon and the sun were of no help to their worshipers.
NET Bible® copyright ©1996-2017 by Biblical Studies Press, L.L.C. http://netbible.com All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2015 by The Lockman Foundation, La Habra, CA 90631. All rights reserved.
